


the darkest little paradise

by kathillards



Category: Kamen Rider Ex-Aid
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Dubious Consent, M/M, Non-consensual body possession
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-27
Updated: 2018-08-27
Packaged: 2019-07-03 06:04:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,322
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15812940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kathillards/pseuds/kathillards
Summary: Emu wants to hate it. He wants to hate it so much.





	the darkest little paradise

**Author's Note:**

  * For [summoner_hirelena](https://archiveofourown.org/users/summoner_hirelena/gifts).



> i didn't know how to warn for this but there is a sex scene, it's not super explicit but it is. kind of explicit? so don't read it at work probably. 
> 
> takes place during that whole little arc in ex-aid where parad possesses emu against his will.

The worst part, Emu thinks in the After, as he sits there shivering on the floor of Cyber Rescue, is that he didn’t hate it. And oh, he wanted to.

x

He knows, logically, how the Bugster virus is supposed to work. He’s seen the lines of pain on patients’ faces as they struggle and fight against the infection inside of them. He’s watched them lie in bed, tossing and shaking and crying. He’s seen the Bugsters explode out of their bodies like demons from old myths.

Emu knows how it should feel when it happens to him. Like a thousand stitches on his skin bursting into flames. Like a black pit of tar crawling out from his insides. Like letting loose a hundred spiders in his bloodstream.

It’s an infection. A disease. He’s never met a disease that wasn’t painful.

The trouble is, it doesn’t feel that way.

x

_Don’t tell me_ , murmurs Parad from the inside of his mind, and, oh, isn’t that something that should feel wrong in a million ways? _Don’t tell me he’s actually started to care for you._

He’s looking at Hiiro, standing frozen in terror just across the battlefield. Or maybe he’s looking at Taiga, shaking with fury, shielding Nico with his body. Whatever he sees in their faces, it makes him laugh. The sound is cold and sore in his throat.

Emu wants to reach up and wrap his hands around his neck and choke Parad out of him. He wants to cross that divide to Hiiro and Taiga and beg them to stop him, to kill him before he can do anything. He wants to reach into his insides and drag Parad out of him bloody and screaming like a newborn child.

His feet won’t move. His hands aren’t his. He’s left banging on a locked door as Parad tilts his head, Emu’s hair falling into his—their—his red eyes, and laughs again. Delighted. Destructive.

_Well, that’s fantastic_. Parad’s voice is smooth and white-hot, burning a path through his brain. _Poor little doctors. Should we show them what Genius Gamer M is really like, Emu?_

_No_ , Emu gasps, voiceless. _No, no—don’t do this—don’t hurt him—_

But when his fingers curl around Hiiro’s neck and lift him—terrified and shaking—off the ground, all he can do is watch. And when Taiga rams into his body to stop him, all he can think is—

_Don’t hurt him._

He doesn’t know who he’s talking about, anymore.

x

Parad takes him away. It feels like dissipating into ink, or scattering like a dandelion in the wind, the way he moves. There one second, whirling through the compressed, pixelated world the next.

Emu thinks he might throw up by the time he lands, hard on his knees, on the floor of his own apartment.

Parad’s still there. Still inside. _This is where you live?_ he asks in contempt. _Surely they pay you better than this._

_Get out_ , Emu begs, the taste of vomit rising in his throat. _Get out get out GET OUT GET OUT_.

There’s a great sigh in his mind that’s not him, and then Parad extracts himself. It’s as painful as cutting off two of his own limbs would be. It’s a wrench, a twist, and then he’s left staggering sideways, unsettled by his own weight. Colder than he was a minute ago. Lonelier, somehow.

Emu looks up from the floor and swallows the bile down. Parad is staring at him, eyes dark and dangerous, glittering with an emotion he doesn’t recognize. He stretches a hand out, and before Emu can stop him, he’s grasped Emu’s chin in his hand and holds him steady, just looking and looking.

Waiting.

Judging.

Wanting.

“Is this what you want?” Parad sneers. His lips twist up in an expression Emu remembers well from his video game tournament days. The scorn for the losers. The unabashed delight in crushing their dreams. An expression he had worn, emotions he had felt so intimately, he had thought they were his own.

“Shut up.”

Parad rolls his eyes and curls his fingers tighter around Emu’s face. “Come on, Emu. This place is pathetic. The way those doctors treat you, _that’s_ pathetic. And you just let them? For what? As if you can’t be better than them. As if you don’t deserve better.”

“And what’s better?” Emu manages to spit out. “You?”

Parad’s smile is beckoning and wrathful. “You and me, Emu. Till the end.”

x

He’s sitting on a cloud, or a cliff, or maybe the edge of the world. The hospital seems a million miles away, and it’s right in front of him. Through a curtain of pixels, he watches the people he had used to love.

_You know they don’t care about you._

Parad sounds bored, almost disinterested. Has almost perfected the art of pretending not to care. Emu’s never managed that, so it’s not complete on Parad, either. He’s never learned how to not care about people. Never even wanted to.

_Go away._

Emu squeezes his eyes shut, as if that will help, but it’s as if he’s two feet tall standing in a dark room and Parad is looming on the outside of the door, and the only part of his body he has access to is his mind. He tries to bang on the door, but Parad only laughs and pulls the lock tighter.

_Don’t be so pathetic,_ says Parad now, boredom fading to disgust. _They never cared about you. They wouldn’t have hurt you like that if they did. You think Hiiro gives a damn if it’s you or me?_

He does. _He does he does HE DOES—_

_He doesn’t_. Parad’s voice is cold and unforgiving. _He only uses you for Ex-Aid. He doesn’t care about you. Emu. Genius Gamer M. He doesn’t know anything about you._

The door is unlocking, and now he’s staring straight at Parad, eye to eye, the world falling apart all around them. He’s on a mountain. He’s on the hospital roof. He’s on a sidewalk carrying a yellow umbrella watching the sky rain.

_But I do_ , says Parad, teeth glinting in a smile. _Only I know all of you, Emu. Only me._

He reaches out and his hand presses hot against Emu’s chest, like he can dig in deep and extract his heart from his ribcage, and then he leans in and Emu stumbles back and suddenly, all there is, is _this_. Is him and Parad and Parad-and-him and nothing and no one in between.

Maybe there was never anything in between in the first place.

Maybe this is all him, in the end.

x

On the battlefield, Taiga screams at him: “Snap out of it, Ex-Aid!”

Parad snorts. _Can’t even be bothered to use your real name._

Behind Taiga, he can see Nico, her arms wrapped around herself, the set of her jaw shaky but determined. One of her hands clutches her Gashat, a protective armor. Her eyes track Hiiro and Taiga through the field, anxious and praying.

He wishes he could go to her. Tell her it would all be okay. Ask her to slap him out of this. Promise her that they would beat this level.

“Intern,” says Hiiro, suddenly in front of him. His hands curl desperately around Emu’s—Parad’s—no, Emu’s sleeves. “Look at me. You have to—you have to get rid of him, he’s infecting you, he’s—”

_I’m not an infection_ , murmurs Parad, low and dangerous. Emu can feel himself shrinking, Parad rising up inside him. _He doesn’t use your fucking name either. Do you see, Emu? Do you see how little they care for you?_

“Emu!” yells Nico from the other side of the field. “Stop doing that!”

_I’m not doing anything_ , he protests, but can’t say, and then he blinks and Hiiro is lying crumpled on the ground in front of him and Taiga has his gun aimed at him. _I’m not—Parad, stop it—stop it STOP IT—_

“Get the fuck out of there, Parad,” hisses Taiga. Emu watches helplessly as Hiiro struggles to get up, an open wound gushing blood on his chin. “Let him go.”

“Have you considered,” Parad says slowly, a wicked smile lighting up Emu’s face, “that he doesn’t want me to?”

Taiga stops. Hiiro gets to his feet with a mighty heave, and then his fist impacts Emu’s chest so hard and so fast that even Parad doesn’t have time to block him.

“How sweet,” Parad drawls, spitting blood as he gets back to his feet. Emu can feel the bruises blooming on his body, but they don’t seem to affect Parad at all. “Emu’s knight in shining armor.”

 “Hiiro,” warns Taiga, grasping his arm and dragging him back before he can lunge forward again. “Hiiro, don’t. You’re injured.”

_They care for each other more than they will ever care for you_ , Parad sneers, and his voice strikes through to all of Emu’s insecurities, straight into his fragile, wrecked heart, and then all he knows is fading around him and he can’t see Hiiro or Taiga or Poppy or Nico anymore, not even when he reaches for them with all that he has—

x

_What did you do to them?_

Parad rolls his eyes. _Paranoid, much? I didn’t do anything. They abandoned the battle. Abandoned you._

Emu sits on his bed and pulls his knees up to his chest like he’s ten years old again, scared of the thunder. _They wouldn’t do that. They wouldn’t. They wouldn’t._ He’s shaking all over. Parad’s essence inside him is a slick, smooth thing that coils around his chest like a snake, squeezing so tight he can’t breathe.

_But they did._ Parad seems to have lost interest in taunting him about this. His tone of voice is bored and dismissive. _Who cares about them? They’re worth nothing._

_They’re worth it to me._ He rocks back and forth, trying and trying to keep Hiiro in his mind’s eye, to remember the shape of Poppy’s smile and the color of Taiga’s hair, the way Nico laughed at him, the way Dr. Kagami took his coffee, everything, anything. There’s a white-hot heat spreading from the center of his chest outwards into his body, hooking deep into his bones.

_Are they?_ Parad is behind him and inside him at the same time, his voice tickling the back of Emu’s neck and echoing in his head. _What are they worth to you, Emu? What are they worth to the genius gamer?_

_Stop calling me that._ Emu clamps his hands over his ears as if that will get rid of the monster inside him. _I’m not you. I’m not the genius gamer M. I’m not._

Parad goes quiet for a moment, everything stilling inside Emu’s mind. And then he asks, in a voice much smaller than he usually takes: _Do you not want me here, Emu?_

It’s such a stupid question, Emu nearly laughs out loud. _Do I want you—of course I don—_

But when Parad starts to draw away this time, the chill of his absence makes him panic. Emu presses a hand to his chest, as if that will hold Parad there, and squeezes his eyes shut, thinking: _Wait._

Parad stops, but his voice is disdainful, high with scorn when he says: _You would choose Brave and Snipe over me. You want them here instead. Even though they don’t care about you, not like I do—_

_It’s not like that._ Emu hisses between his teeth. It’s like Parad has given him too much control and not enough at the same time. _You’re a Bugster. We’re enemies._

_We’re not enemies_ , Parad says, wounded. “We’re playing a game.”

Emu blinks and looks up. Parad is standing in front of him, dark hair ruffled as if he’s been in a windstorm, frown lines written on his face. He looks troubled, fists clenched at his side as he stares Emu down, gaze raking over him like he’s attempting to unravel him.

“This—my body isn’t a game,” Emu says, testing his voice. He’s still curled up on his bed, and Parad is standing at the foot of it. Looking down at him. Waiting for something again. “My friends aren’t a game.”

Parad’s eyes go dark; he leans down and down and down until he and Emu are eye level. “What about this?” he asks, and it’s a child’s question, petulant and resentful. Emu feels a little like a child, staring up at him. And then he feels that tug of heat, deep inside, calling him to Parad and it’s like he has no past at all, no future, nothing but this.

“You’re not—” Emu tries, but the words won’t coagulate on his tongue. It feels dry and sticky at the same time. His mouth is on fire. “This isn’t right.”

“What do you _want_ , Emu?” Parad asks, impatient, edging closer and closer. Emu closes his eyes and his vision swims with Parad’s face, Parad’s hands, the feeling of him inside his head. “Tell me you want Brave here instead.”

Emu can’t.

“Since when have you cared what I wanted?” he spits out instead. His spine feels like jelly, like he might collapse the instant Parad steps away. But he doesn’t. All he does is lean closer, and all Emu can see is the way his eyes shine in the low lights, the twist to his lips as he considers the question.

“Fine,” says Parad and then he crashes into Emu. It’s like ten weights have dropped on top of his chest. He’s burning everywhere; he drops backwards like he’s a sinking stone in the ocean. His bed is a faraway space beneath him.

He’s falling and falling and falling. _Parad_ —

_I’m here_.

And all at once, he’s been snapped back into place.

_Why did you do that?_ Emu asks, lying still on top of his sheets, his heart hammering away in his ribcage. It rattles like a lost rabbit, racing for shelter. His own body is a hostage situation. He wraps his arms around stomach and tries to calm his breathing.

_You said I didn’t care what you wanted._ Parad is standing in front of him and behind him at the same time. He tips his head up to look at the sky and it fades from blue to black to white. _But I do. You think I don’t know you, Emu—but I do._

Emu slides one hand up to press against his chest, to feel his heart where it lies caught in Parad’s trap. _What is it you think I want?_

Parad is inside him and around him and above him. He laughs, low in his throat, and Emu feels his own hand drifting down his body. He’s not sure who’s moving it.

He’s afraid it might be him.

_You tell me_. Parad’s eyes flash and the two of them are standing in an empty room, staring each other down. Emu opens his eyes and he’s looking up at the ceiling of his bedroom again. _You want this, don’t you? You’re the one doing it._

Emu stops his hand. _I didn’t mean to—_

But he did, he did, he did.

His hand twitches and slides down the length of his torso. Parad does nothing, only watches, as a steady humming inside Emu, a buzz in his head that makes him feel dizzy and warm all the way straight through his bones. He wants to move his hand away, but the direction gets caught between his rational brain and his body and disappears.

_You’re not doing this?_

_No_ , says Parad. His grin is crooked. _All you._

_You’re a liar_ , Emu tries to tell himself. But he’s hard and he aches, and he wants nothing more than to be free, so he drags his hand down in between his legs, under his jeans, and wraps it around his cock.

Everything, for just a second, goes black with a monstrous heat.

_You don’t have to,_ Parad tells him, but his voice strokes something deep within Emu that won’t be quieted. _You can think of Brave while you—_

“Shut up,” Emu snaps. He squeezes his eyes shut and screws up his courage and then says, as quietly as possible: _Please, do this._

_You want me to do it?_ Parad doesn’t seem as maliciously delighted as Emu had thought. His voice curls into Emu’s head and lingers like a feather caught in a tree.

Emu inhales, exhales. His thumb strokes up, down, and his leg jolts. _Yes._

The next time his hand moves, it isn’t him. He feels something loosen inside him, a screw undone, and then all his uncertainties are dust in the wind. Parad slides his hand up his cock with devastating heat, all his fingers curling around the length of it and sending fire through his blood. It’s strange, motions he’s done a hundred times on his own, now somehow different—wilder and deeper and more real, with Parad behind them.

_Keep going_ , Emu urges when Parad slows his hand. _Keep—I need more._

He’s not sure what for, since his nerves are already exploding one by one every time Parad moves his hand, but it’s not enough. It never feels like enough, not with Parad in his head, watching him from the inside, the two of them sharing one body as if it can fit both of them. It always feels like he’s just on the edge of unlocking a puzzle, of putting all the pieces together in just the right way, and then Parad does something to pull it all apart.

_Will you go back to them?_ Parad murmurs in his head, his strokes slowing just enough to make Emu groan from the lack of pressure. His legs are trembling, his whole body shaking from the effort of this. _When this is over._

_Is it over?_ Emu feels his hips jerk, trying to grind down against an invisible force. Parad squeezes him gently and he moans out loud. _Is this the end?_

Parad is quiet for a good, long moment, and then he says: _Maybe_.

And then his hand twists, and the walls of his bedroom fall away, everything on fire and everything burning. Emu gasps out loud, his other hand pressing into his chest, hearing his heart rate triple in time to Parad’s fingers stroking up his cock just as the heat sizzling inside him reaches a crescendo he hadn’t thought possible.

Nothing about this seems possible. His thoughts are hazy, clouded. All he knows is this, again: him and Parad and him-and-Parad. Like there was never anything else. Like there never will be again. The hospital, Cyber Rescue, Hiiro, Taiga, Poppy—they are as far from his mind as they have ever been.

He thinks he should feel some sense of triumph, some sort of smugness radiating from Parad—but when he comes down from his high, his hand has gone still on his leg and he can’t feel Parad anywhere inside him.

_Parad_? Emu opens his eyes and finds himself staring up at his ceiling again, his hand sticky with his orgasm, the rest of his body sweaty and exhausted all of a sudden. _Where did you go?_

He tries not to sound desperate. Tries not to feel the cold seeping into his bones. Tries not to search out the painful heat of Parad inside and all around him.

He fails.

When he jolts to a sitting position and looks around, there is nothing there. It’s like Parad disappeared as soon as he had what he wanted—or maybe he just didn’t want to face the consequences of it.

_God_. Emu drops his head down into his free hand and tries hard to summon any sort of hatred, any disgust for what he’s done, but nothing comes up. Only emptiness, and a chill that claws at his skin and slides under his muscles.

Only him—and _only_ him.


End file.
